RESEARCH
What does scientific research show about hypnosis and hypnotherapy?
Hypnosis and hypnotherapy have been studied in medicine, psychology and psychotherapy for several decades. The strength of the evidence, however, is not the same in every area. Some applications are supported by a developed body of controlled clinical trials, systematic reviews, meta-analyses and professional guidelines; in other areas there are favourable findings, but their number or methodological quality is not yet sufficient for a reliable clinical conclusion.
Sources are listed directly below each areaResearch areas
A review of 49 meta-analyses, based on 261 distinct primary studies, found that the overall research support was strongest for the use of hypnosis during medical procedures and for pain management. Results nevertheless differ considerably according to the health problem, therapeutic protocol and outcome being measured.
The question is therefore not simply whether hypnosis works. The more important scientific question is: for which problem, on which outcome, within what procedure and with what degree of confidence may it have an effect?
This page does not select only positive results. It also includes research in which the expected effect was not confirmed, because the limits of a finding are as important as its confirmed effects.
Important note on terminology and the scope of evidence
The term used below depends on the procedure examined by a particular study. Some research investigates a brief hypnotic intervention, other research examines multi-session hypnotherapy, and some studies examine training in self-hypnosis. These procedures are not automatically interchangeable.
The same applies to the scope of the results. A study of a particular hypnotic protocol, in a defined population and for a specific problem, provides evidence about that protocol and that outcome. On its own, that evidence does not establish the effectiveness of every other method involving hypnosis; transferring a finding to another procedure — including the Convergent Method™ as a whole — requires separate research.
Source
Rosendahl, J., Alldredge, C. T., & Haddenhorst, A. (2024). Meta-analytic evidence on the efficacy of hypnosis for mental and somatic health issues: a 20-year perspective. Frontiers in Psychology, 14, 1330238. DOI: 10.3389/fpsyg.2023.1330238.
Irritable bowel syndrome in adults
Gut-directed hypnotherapy is one of the more extensively studied clinical applications of hypnosis.
The network meta-analysis by Black and colleagues included controlled studies of different psychological therapies for irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Gut-directed hypnotherapy was among the interventions with the largest research base. In the pooled analysis, hypnotherapy was associated with a lower probability that patients would remain symptomatic after treatment. The authors nevertheless also noted a risk of bias in some of the included studies.
Further support came from the multicentre IMAGINE trial, in which participants were randomly allocated to individual hypnotherapy, group hypnotherapy or an educational-supportive control treatment. When the two hypnotherapy groups were analysed together, hypnotherapy showed an advantage over the control treatment at both three and twelve months. Group hypnotherapy also met the pre-specified criterion for non-inferiority in comparison with individual hypnotherapy.
Gut-directed hypnotherapy therefore has a developed base of clinical support for IBS. This finding does not mean that hypnotherapy is appropriate for every patient or that it replaces gastroenterological assessment and other medically justified forms of treatment.
Sources
Black, C. J., Thakur, E. R., Houghton, L. A., Quigley, E. M. M., Moayyedi, P., & Ford, A. C. (2020). Efficacy of psychological therapies for irritable bowel syndrome: systematic review and network meta-analysis. Gut, 69(8), 1441–1451. DOI: 10.1136/gutjnl-2020-321191.
Flik, C. E., Laan, W., Zuithoff, N. P. A., van Rood, Y. R., Smout, A. J. P. M., Weusten, B. L. A. M., Whorwell, P. J., & de Wit, N. J. (2019). Efficacy of individual and group hypnotherapy in irritable bowel syndrome (IMAGINE): a multicentre randomised controlled trial. The Lancet Gastroenterology & Hepatology, 4(1), 20–31. DOI: 10.1016/S2468-1253(18)30310-8.
Functional abdominal pain and IBS in children and adolescents
Research support is particularly developed for children and adolescents with irritable bowel syndrome and functional abdominal pain.
A large controlled trial compared individual hypnotherapy with standardised hypnotic exercises that children used at home. One year after treatment, the home-based programme met the pre-specified criterion for non-inferiority: it did not fall behind individual therapy by more than the margin the researchers had previously defined as clinically acceptable.
A later network meta-analysis further strengthened the evidence base. The greatest clinical weight, however, comes from the joint guidelines of the European and North American societies for paediatric gastroenterology (ESPGHAN and NASPGHAN). The 2025 guidelines recommend hypnotherapy as a treatment option with a strong recommendation and moderate certainty of evidence.
In those guidelines, hypnotherapy received the highest GRADE level of certainty among the treatment options assessed.
Sources
Rutten, J. M. T. M., Vlieger, A. M., Frankenhuis, C., George, E. K., Groeneweg, M., Norbruis, O. F., ten Tjon, W. A., van Wering, H. M., Dijkgraaf, M. G. W., Merkus, M. P., & Benninga, M. A. (2017). Home-Based Hypnotherapy Self-exercises vs Individual Hypnotherapy With a Therapist for Treatment of Pediatric Irritable Bowel Syndrome, Functional Abdominal Pain, or Functional Abdominal Pain Syndrome: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Pediatrics, 171(5), 470–477. DOI: 10.1001/jamapediatrics.2017.0091.
Sinopoulou, V., Groen, J., Gordon, M., Mougey, E., Franciosi, J. P., de Meij, T. G. J., Tabbers, M. M., & Benninga, M. A. (2025). Efficacy of interventions for the treatment of irritable bowel syndrome, functional abdominal pain-not otherwise specified, and abdominal migraine in children: a systematic review and network meta-analysis. The Lancet Child & Adolescent Health, 9(5), 315–324. DOI: 10.1016/S2352-4642(25)00058-6.
Groen, J., Gordon, M., Chogle, A., Benninga, M., Borlack, R., Borrelli, O., Darbari, A., Dolinsek, J., Khlevner, J., Di Lorenzo, C., Person, H., Sanghavi, R., Snyder, J., Thapar, N., Vlieger, A., Sinopoulou, V., Tabbers, M., & Saps, M. (2025). ESPGHAN/NASPGHAN guidelines for treatment of irritable bowel syndrome and functional abdominal pain-not otherwise specified in children aged 4–18 years. Journal of Pediatric Gastroenterology and Nutrition, 81(2), 442–471. DOI: 10.1002/jpn3.70070.
Hypnosis alongside medical procedures
One of the most developed bodies of evidence concerns hypnosis as an adjunct to standard medical care — before surgery, during certain invasive procedures or immediately afterwards.
The 2025 systematic review and meta-analysis by Walter and colleagues combined 20 controlled studies with 1,250 participants. In the pooled analysis, hypnosis was associated with lower pain and anxiety during invasive medical procedures. The average effect, however, was not the same in every clinical situation.
The pooled result therefore does not erase differences between individual studies. Montgomery and colleagues found less pain, nausea, fatigue, physical discomfort and emotional distress at discharge among patients undergoing breast surgery, as well as lower use of certain anaesthetic agents.
The HYPNOSEIN trial, by contrast, did not confirm the expected benefit of hypnosis on its primary outcome — postoperative pain. Differences were nevertheless found in some other outcomes, including lower use of certain anaesthetic agents, a shorter stay in the post-anaesthesia care unit and less fatigue on the evening after surgery.
In children with cancer, Liossi, White and Hatira studied venepuncture. Adding a hypnotic intervention to a local anaesthetic was associated with less pain, anxiety and behavioural distress than the local anaesthetic alone or the local anaesthetic combined with additional therapist attention.
These findings indicate that hypnosis may improve some outcomes of medical procedures, particularly those relating to pain and anxiety, but its effect is not the same for every procedure or every outcome. In these studies, hypnosis is used as an adjunct, not as a replacement for anaesthesia, analgesia or another necessary medical procedure.
Sources
Walter, N., Torres Leyva, M., Hinterberger, T., Rupp, M., Loew, T., Lambert-Delgado, A., & Cobián Mena, A. E. (2025). Hypnosis as a non-pharmacological intervention for invasive medical procedures – A systematic review and meta-analytic update. Journal of Psychosomatic Research, 192, 112117. DOI: 10.1016/j.jpsychores.2025.112117.
Montgomery, G. H., Bovbjerg, D. H., Schnur, J. B., David, D., Goldfarb, A., Weltz, C. R., Schechter, C., Graff-Zivin, J., Tatrow, K., Price, D. D., & Silverstein, J. H. (2007). A randomized clinical trial of a brief hypnosis intervention to control side effects in breast surgery patients. Journal of the National Cancer Institute, 99(17), 1304–1312. DOI: 10.1093/jnci/djm106.
Amraoui, J., Pouliquen, C., Fraisse, J., Dubourdieu, J., Rey Dit Guzer, S., Leclerc, G., de Forges, H., Jarlier, M., Gutowski, M., Bleuse, J.-P., Janiszewski, C., Diaz, J., & Cuvillon, P. (2018). Effects of a Hypnosis Session Before General Anesthesia on Postoperative Outcomes in Patients Who Underwent Minor Breast Cancer Surgery: The HYPNOSEIN Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Network Open, 1(4), e181164. DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2018.1164.
Liossi, C., White, P., & Hatira, P. (2009). A randomized clinical trial of a brief hypnosis intervention to control venepuncture-related pain of paediatric cancer patients. Pain, 142(3), 255–263. DOI: 10.1016/j.pain.2009.01.017.
Dental anxiety
When considering fear of dental treatment, it is necessary to distinguish immediate anxiety during a particular procedure from persistent dental anxiety and dental phobia.
The 2024 systematic review and meta-analyses by Steenen and colleagues found a small but statistically significant effect of hypnosis on immediate anxiety during oral surgery. The authors rated the certainty of this evidence as moderate.
The finding concerns immediate anxiety during a procedure. It does not establish hypnosis as a proven treatment for persistent dental anxiety or dental phobia; that conclusion would require separate evidence in those populations.
Source
Steenen, S. A., Linke, F., van Westrhenen, R., & de Jongh, A. (2024). Interventions to reduce adult state anxiety, dental trait anxiety, and dental phobia: A systematic review and meta-analyses of randomized controlled trials. Journal of Anxiety Disorders, 105, 102891. DOI: 10.1016/j.janxdis.2024.102891.
Chronic pain
Hypnosis has long been studied in relation to pain, but experimental pain, acute procedural pain and chronic clinical pain are not the same research problem.
The 2024 systematic review by Jones and colleagues included 88 studies with a total of 7,356 participants, while 70 studies with 6,078 participants were included in the meta-analyses. When hypnosis was added to usual care, a small average additional analgesic effect was found for chronic pain. The overall certainty of the evidence, however, was very low, so the true size of the effect remains uncertain.
Hypnosis may have a place as an additional method in the management of certain forms of chronic pain, but the reliability and size of the effect depend on the particular pain condition and the way hypnosis is used.
Source
Jones, H. G., Rizzo, R. R. N., Pulling, B. W., Braithwaite, F. A., Grant, A. R., McAuley, J. H., Jensen, M. P., Moseley, G. L., Rees, A., & Stanton, T. R. (2024). Adjunctive use of hypnosis for clinical pain: a systematic review and meta-analysis. PAIN Reports, 9(5), e1185. DOI: 10.1097/PR9.0000000000001185.
Hot flushes and menopausal vasomotor symptoms
Hypnosis has also been studied as a non-pharmacological intervention for menopausal hot flushes.
A 2013 controlled trial by Elkins and colleagues, involving 187 postmenopausal women, found a substantially greater reduction in the frequency and severity of hot flushes in the clinical hypnosis group than in the group receiving structured attention.
A more recent 2025 trial involving 250 women is particularly important. Self-administered hypnosis using audio recordings was compared with an active control intervention designed to account for treatment expectation and other non-specific effects. After six weeks, improvement was greater in the hypnosis group, although the control group also achieved significant improvement.
This result indicates that hypnosis produced an additional benefit beyond the active control, while also allowing a more realistic estimate of its specific effect: the full change observed in the hypnosis group cannot be attributed to hypnosis alone.
Sources
Elkins, G. R., Fisher, W. I., Johnson, A. K., Carpenter, J. S., & Keith, T. Z. (2013). Clinical hypnosis in the treatment of postmenopausal hot flashes: a randomized controlled trial. Menopause, 20(3), 291–298. DOI: 10.1097/GME.0b013e31826ce3ed.
Elkins, G., Arring, N., Morgan, G., Lorenz, T., Muniz, V., Lafferty, C., Scheffrahn, K., Alldredge, C., & Barton, D. (2025). Self-Administered Hypnosis vs Sham Hypnosis for Hot Flashes: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Network Open, 8(11), e2542537. DOI: 10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2025.42537.
Chemotherapy-related nausea and vomiting
Hypnosis has been studied as an adjunct in managing chemotherapy-related nausea and vomiting, particularly anticipatory symptoms — symptoms that may occur before treatment following previous unpleasant experiences of chemotherapy.
The systematic review by Richardson and colleagues identified six controlled studies, five of which involved children. Results were favourable, particularly for anticipatory nausea and vomiting, but the small number of studies and predominantly paediatric samples limit the extent to which the finding can be generalised to adults and to other forms of these symptoms.
Source
Richardson, J., Smith, J. E., McCall, G., Richardson, A., Pilkington, K., & Kirsch, I. (2007). Hypnosis for nausea and vomiting in cancer chemotherapy: a systematic review of the research evidence. European Journal of Cancer Care, 16(5), 402–412. DOI: 10.1111/j.1365-2354.2006.00736.x.
Migraine
Hypnosis has been studied for migraine for a long time, but a contemporary overall assessment of the evidence became available only recently.
The 2026 systematic review by Cardinal and colleagues included nine studies with a total of 406 participants. Results generally indicated a possible benefit, but the studies differed so substantially in the delivery of hypnosis, participant characteristics and measured outcomes that the authors could not conduct a meta-analysis.
This limitation changes the strength of the conclusion. Several positive individual results are not the same as stable pooled evidence when the studies are not sufficiently comparable.
Source
Cardinal, É., Landry, M., Chevestrier, A., Désilets, M., Fournier, V., Rousseaux, F., Rainville, P., & Ogez, D. (2026). Medical hypnosis for migraine management: A systematic review. Complementary Therapies in Medicine, 99, 103374. DOI: 10.1016/j.ctim.2026.103374.
Hypnosis in preparation for childbirth
Hypnosis and self-hypnosis have been studied during pregnancy as ways of preparing for childbirth and coping with labour pain.
The Cochrane systematic review included nine controlled studies with 2,954 women. The pooled result suggested a possible reduction in the overall use of pharmacological pain relief, but the certainty of this evidence was very low.
No clear difference was found for other important outcomes, including use of epidural analgesia, satisfaction with pain relief, perceived ability to cope with labour and the likelihood of spontaneous vaginal birth.
The signal of a possible reduction in overall use of pharmacological pain relief is therefore not reliable evidence that hypnosis reduces labour pain or the need for medical analgesia.
Source
Madden, K., Middleton, P., Cyna, A. M., Matthewson, M., & Jones, L. (2016). Hypnosis for pain management during labour and childbirth. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2016(5), CD009356. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD009356.pub3.
Functional dyspepsia
There are favourable findings for functional dyspepsia, but the research base is substantially narrower than it is for irritable bowel syndrome.
In a controlled trial involving 126 patients, Calvert and colleagues compared hypnotherapy with supportive therapy plus placebo and with medical treatment. The hypnotherapy group showed greater improvement in symptoms and quality of life, and that favourable result remained present during longer-term follow-up.
The long-term result nevertheless requires cautious interpretation. All phases of the study were completed by 79 of the 126 originally allocated patients: 26 in the hypnotherapy group, 24 in the supportive group and 29 in the medical-treatment group. Participant attrition therefore limits confidence in the estimate of the long-term effect.
The strength of this positive finding does not remove the broader limitation: the study was not followed by a sufficiently large body of independent, methodologically strong research replicating the result across different centres and populations.
Source
Calvert, E. L., Houghton, L. A., Cooper, P., Morris, J., & Whorwell, P. J. (2002). Long-term improvement in functional dyspepsia using hypnotherapy. Gastroenterology, 123(6), 1778–1785. DOI: 10.1053/gast.2002.37071.
Relationship with food and body weight
Hypnosis is often presented as a method for weight loss, but higher-quality research requires a narrower and more precise conclusion.
Bo and colleagues added self-hypnosis to a programme for people with severe obesity that already included diet, physical activity and behavioural change. After one year, both groups had lost weight, but there was no statistically significant difference between them in the primary outcome — change in body weight.
The group that learned self-hypnosis nevertheless showed more favourable results for satiety and quality of life.
The HYPNODIET trial asked a different question. Its primary outcome was eating disinhibition — a tendency to lose control over food intake under the influence of emotional, external or other cues. The hypnosis group achieved a substantially more favourable result on this outcome, whereas the finding for body weight itself was much less convincing.
For that reason, the phrase “relationship with food and weight” is scientifically more precise than “weight loss”: it describes the outcomes for which relevant findings exist without promising an outcome that research has not reliably confirmed.
Sources
Bo, S., Rahimi, F., Goitre, I., Properzi, B., Ponzo, V., Regaldo, G., Boschetti, S., Fadda, M., Ciccone, G., Abbate Daga, G., Mengozzi, G., Evangelista, A., De Francesco, A., Belcastro, S., & Broglio, F. (2018). Effects of Self-Conditioning Techniques (Self-Hypnosis) in Promoting Weight Loss in Patients with Severe Obesity: A Randomized Controlled Trial. Obesity, 26(9), 1422–1429. DOI: 10.1002/oby.22262.
Delestre, F., Lehéricey, G., Estellat, C., Diallo, M. H., Hansel, B., & Giral, P. (2022). Hypnosis reduces food impulsivity in patients with obesity and high levels of disinhibition: HYPNODIET randomized controlled clinical trial. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 115(6), 1637–1645. DOI: 10.1093/ajcn/nqac046.
Sleep and sleep disturbance
Research on hypnosis for improving sleep has produced inconsistent results.
The systematic review by Wofford and colleagues included 44 studies. Positive results were reported by 47.7% of the studies, mixed results by 22.7%, while 29.5% found no clear effect. Results were somewhat more favourable in the narrower group of studies that included people with sleep problems and used suggestions specifically directed towards sleep.
Large differences among the studies — in populations, hypnotic protocols and methods of measuring sleep — do not permit a single pooled conclusion.
Source
Wofford, N., Snyder, M., Corlett, C. E., & Elkins, G. R. (2023). Systematic Review of Hypnotherapy for Sleep and Sleep Disturbance. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 71(3), 176–215. DOI: 10.1080/00207144.2023.2226177.
Anxiety
Hypnosis has been studied in different forms of anxiety, but the term does not always refer to the same clinical problem across studies.
The meta-analysis by Valentine and colleagues included 15 studies with 17 comparisons between hypnosis and control conditions. The pooled result favoured hypnosis. The effect was greater when hypnosis was used alongside other psychological procedures than when it was used on its own.
The limit of this finding is as important as its direction. Immediate anxiety before a medical procedure, anxiety associated with a specific symptom, a specific phobia and a diagnosed anxiety disorder are not the same phenomenon. The pooled result therefore does not establish that hypnosis is equally effective for every anxiety disorder, every fear or every specific phobia.
Source
Valentine, K. E., Milling, L. S., Clark, L. J., & Moriarty, C. L. (2019). The Efficacy of Hypnosis as a Treatment for Anxiety: A Meta-Analysis. International Journal of Clinical and Experimental Hypnosis, 67(3), 336–363. DOI: 10.1080/00207144.2019.1613863.
Depressive symptoms and depressive disorder
Research on hypnotherapy for depression shows why a favourable result from one clinical trial is not the same as a secure conclusion about an entire therapeutic field.
Fuhr and colleagues compared hypnotherapy with cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) in 152 people with a mild to moderate major depressive episode. Hypnotherapy met the pre-specified statistical criterion for non-inferiority. This means that, in that study, it did not fall behind CBT by more than the previously defined acceptable margin — it does not mean that the two therapies have been shown to be equivalent in every clinical context.
The 2024 systematic review by Souza and colleagues assessed the body of controlled research as a whole. Its conclusion was considerably more cautious: current evidence is not sufficiently reliable to support a clinical recommendation of hypnotherapy as a treatment for major depressive disorder. The authors found a high risk of bias in most included studies.
Sources
Fuhr, K., Meisner, C., Broch, A., Cyrny, B., Hinkel, J., Jaberg, J., Petrasch, M., Schweizer, C., Stiegler, A., Zeep, C., & Batra, A. (2021). Efficacy of hypnotherapy compared to cognitive behavioral therapy for mild to moderate depression – Results of a randomized controlled rater-blind clinical trial. Journal of Affective Disorders, 286, 166–173. DOI: 10.1016/j.jad.2021.02.069.
Souza, F. L., Moura, M. S., Vieira Almeida Silva, J., & Elkins, G. (2024). Hypnosis for depression: Systematic review of randomized clinical trials with meta-analysis. Complementary Therapies in Clinical Practice, 57, 101913. DOI: 10.1016/j.ctcp.2024.101913.
Smoking cessation
Hypnotherapy has long been used and promoted as an aid to smoking cessation. For that reason, it is particularly important to distinguish the popularity of the method from the certainty of the scientific evidence.
The 2019 Cochrane systematic review assessed controlled studies of hypnotherapy for smoking cessation. The results did not provide a sufficiently reliable basis for concluding that hypnotherapy is more effective than other forms of behavioural support or than attempts to stop smoking without such an intervention.
Some comparisons produced more favourable results, but the certainty of that evidence was very low because of risk of bias, small samples and imprecise estimates. This conclusion does not establish that hypnotherapy has no effect — it shows that its advantage has not yet been reliably demonstrated.
Source
Barnes, J., McRobbie, H., Dong, C. Y., Walker, N., & Hartmann-Boyce, J. (2019). Hypnotherapy for smoking cessation. Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, 2019(6), CD001008. DOI: 10.1002/14651858.CD001008.pub3.
How should these results be read?
Scientific evidence is not a simple division between “works” and “does not work”.
The same label — hypnosis or hypnotherapy — can include different procedures, different numbers and lengths of sessions, different modes of delivery and different therapeutic aims. At the same time, studies do not always measure the same outcome. A reduction in anxiety is not the same as a reduction in pain; a reduction in pain is not the same as a reduced need for analgesics; a change in a person's relationship with food is not the same as weight loss.
A result should therefore not be extended beyond the question that the study actually examined.
Confidence in a conclusion increases when a similar result is repeated across several well-controlled studies, confirmed by systematic reviews and meta-analyses and, after assessment of benefit, risk and certainty of evidence, incorporated into professional clinical guidelines. For that reason, the areas presented on this page do not have the same evidential status.
The scientific value of hypnosis does not rest on a claim that it works everywhere. It rests on the ability to determine precisely where its effect is sufficiently well established, where it remains only promising and where the evidence is still insufficient.